Lance Finally Loses

ESPN.com's "Page 2," apparently having grown weary of dishing out the latest on Ben Affleck's love life or extolling the virtues of "The O.C.", recently decided to try something novel and write about sports. Its first order of business? To settle once and for all the classic barstool debate: Who is currently the "World's Greatest Athlete?"

After establishing a field of 64 -- with candidates ranging from NFL superstars to Swedish cross country skiers -- the dirty work was handed over to the readers, who after whittling the group down to a final four of Michael Vick, Randy Moss, Lance Armstrong and Barry Bonds, voted Armstrong as the single greatest athlete in the world today.

Coming from the creators of ESPN Classic and the "Dream Job" reality series, it should surprise no one that what was, at its genesis, an intriguing concept, failed miserably in its implementation. You see, in its desire to involve its readers, "Page 2" ignored a well-established canon: Never hand a decision of any magnitude over to the public.

No offense, but as we've seen with "American Idol," the 2000 Presidential election, and the search to find the newest Lucky Charm, democracy is the governmental equivalent of the 2004 Phillies -- while it may look great on paper, it rarely produces satisfying results.

This column, on the other hand, is a dictatorship, and therefore free from having to place its trust in a nation that inexplicably allowed the purple M&M to triumph. So let me take you through -- systematically and indisputably -- who deserves the title of "World's Greatest Athlete."

Step 1: For starters, what makes someone an exceptional athlete? I guess you could say a gifted athlete is a lot like pornography, leprosy, or the infield fly rule: While you may not be able to describe it, you sure as hell know it when you see it.

Step 2: O.K., if we can't affix a Webster's to it, can we at least establish some criteria? Not only can we lay down some guidelines, we can make them so constrictive, only the Top 5 athletes on the planet will be left standing when we're done. Here we go...

1. With apologies to Vladimir Guerrero, Tiger Woods, and ... uh, that's about it ... no baseball players, golfers or NASCAR drivers. If I really need to explain my reasoning, we're off to a bad start.

2. At a minimum, you've got to be able to dunk a basketball, do a standing back flip, or outrun the Miami Police Department. Goodbye Tim Deboom (triathlon), Freddy Adu (soccer), and Ty Law (fugitive).

3. You've got to make it look easy. True story: My older brother Dave played high-school football with a genetic freak named Pat Davis. Despite earning All-State honors in football, basketball, and shot-put (His junior year he watched some of the guys go through the technique, walked up to the line, picked up the shot, and crudely hurled it 30 feet beyond everyone. Six weeks later he was a state champion), Pat refused to lift weights. Simply wouldn't do it.

During mandatory football lifting sessions, Pat would sit defiantly in the corner, an ever-present box of powdered doughnuts resting in his lap. Three times a week, exasperated coaches would implore Pat to join the rest of the guys, reminding him how "his physical gifts would only take him so far."

Now, Pat was as laid back as they come, but after a while, the constant badgering got to be too much. As Dave tells it,

"So Pat's sitting there, trying to eat his doughnuts, and Coach is in his ear. Finally, he stands up, walks over to where some players were bench-pressing, and mumbles, 'How much is on there?' It's 225 pounds, and these guys are struggling for one or two reps, but it's meaningless to Pat, because he's never been on a bench in his life. He looks at Coach, slides under the weight -- with a doughnut in his mouth -- and proceeds to throw out 18 reps, a school record. He stands up, removes the doughnut, looks at Coach, and asks, 'Am I done?" Coach just nods, turns, and walks away.'"

If some guy you've never heard of can pull that off, the Top 5 athletes in the world had better be effortless in their athleticism. Farewell, Jason Kidd (have you ever seen his jumper?).

4. You've got to inspire legend. During his rookie season, Jevon "The Freak" Kearse, at 265 pounds, ran down wide-receiver Quincy Morgan from behind. Ichiro gunned Terrance Long at third base -- on the fly -- from the right-field wall during his first game in America. Kevin Garnett repeatedly touched the top of the backboard while auditioning for scouts as a senior in high school. Bo Jackson did it all: Ran over Brian Bosworth with the Raiders, ran up the center field wall with the Royals, broke a bat over his knee in frustration. Heck, it's even rumored that Bo could catch flies with his bare hands. To make the cut for the final five, you've got to leave people talking.

5. No one-trick ponies. This is where it gets difficult, eliminating America's choice, Lance Armstrong. Let's get one thing straight: Lance is a freak. He's just not an "athletic" freak. (Although he did show incredible quickness in dumping his saw-me-through-cancer wife for celebrity/trophy Sheryl Crow.)

Lance is really more of a genetic anomaly, blessed with an aerobic engine that has been measured as one of the highest in recorded history. Armstrong has confessed to turning to cycling only when as a youth in ever-tolerant Texas, he showed no proficiency at any of the sports that rednecks recognize and revere - football, baseball or basketball. Lance is what he is - the world's greatest cyclist and most "dominant" athlete, but not the world's "greatest" athlete. Make sense? Put it this way: If you were choosing sides for pickup hoops or doubles tennis, would you choose Lance before Randy Moss, Roy Jones, or A-Rod?

The most rudimentary requirement of a true athlete should be his ability to excel at ANY athletic endeavor, and while speculation is easy, I prefer hard proof. If you haven't shown the ability to shine at a diverse array of athletic pursuits, there is no way you can call yourself the world's best. That means no more Lance, Michael Phelps, Ray Lewis, Brian Urlacher, Vince Carter, Kobe Bryant, or Barry Bonds.

6. No major or recurring injuries. This may seem a little harsh, but it makes sense, and it eliminates popular choices like Vick and Allen Iverson. Here's the logic: if you are truly one of the chosen, one of the Top 5 athletes IN THE WORLD, then I expect Terminator 2-type healing powers.

Think about it. If your physical makeup is so evolved that you can call yourself elite, you shouldn't be rolling an ankle or sitting out with bruised ribs, should you? Take Michael Jordan. We always heard he was sick, or saw him take a hard foul and thought he couldn't go on, but he inevitably went out and hung 47 on the Cavs or Jazz. Or Barry Sanders. They said you could put Barry's ankle in a vice and it wouldn't sprain. You never had to wonder if he was going to be able to go on Sunday. He just did. That's what we're looking for here.

So there we have it, the criteria that have left us with the five finest athletes in the world. Let's meet them...

5. Jeremy Bloom: Hold on a second. Before I lose all credibility for anointing a 5'9", 170-pound, 21-year old white kid the world's fifth greatest athlete, hear me out.

As a top-ranked freestyle skier, Bloom is an early favorite to win Gold at the 2006 Olympics. If you've ever strapped on a pair of boards and dropped into a bump run, you undoubtedly have an appreciation for the agility and strength necessary to become even a serviceable mogul skier. Now image pointing those skis down a pitch steeper than the AOL Stock Chart, ricocheting over snow covered VW Beetles at close to 40 MPH, only to be launched skyward, where after spinning 720 degrees or going inverted, you are mercilessly dropped right back into the mine field with zero margin for error. You don't think that requires freakish athletic ability?

Serving double duty as a member of the University of Colorado's football team, Bloom displays his explosiveness as a kick returner and wide receiver, and his elusiveness as the only Buffalo to not be accused of something illegal this spring. On his first collegiate punt return, Bloom danced 75 yards for a touchdown. Later that same year he added a school-record 94-yard touchdown reception on his way to being named Freshman All-American.

Clearly, being able to simultaneously lay claim as one of the world's best in one sport and excelling in another is remarkable. But where is the legend, you ask? Well, it depends on just how much TV you watch. In the Nitti household, Bloom cemented his place on this list during the 2003 Superstars competition, which my brother Mike and I stumbled upon one lazy afternoon.

What we witnessed was remarkable: A 20-year old Bloom -- the youngest, and far and away smallest competitor in a field that included NFL'ers Ahman Green, Will Allen, Charlie Garner, and Dexter Jackson -- absolutely destroying the field. He won the half-mile in a blistering 2:11. Finished second in the swim to Olympian Ed Moses. Then, in a moment Mike and I still talk about, ran away with the 100-yard dash, finishing .2 seconds off Joey Galloway's course record and leaving the heavy favorite Green with a look of shock rivaled only by that of Bruce Bowen after Derek Fisher's Game 5 dagger.

If you don't believe Bloom belongs, find the videotape. You'll see.

4. Julius Peppers: No less an authority than Ronald Curry, one of the most accomplished two-sport athletes in high-school history, has described his former North Carolina football and basketball teammate as, simply, "a freak of nature."

Here's all you need to know about Peppers. During a 16-month period spanning 1999-2001, I watched the former Tar Heel defensive lineman and power forward:

* Lead the nation with 15 sacks as a sophomore on his way to being named first-team All-American;

* Join an injury depleted Tar Heel basketball team in January and spark a mediocre squad to an improbable Final Four run;

* Against Clemson his junior year, take on two blockers, time his leap perfectly to tip a Woody Danzler pass at the line of scrimmage, then sprint around the blockers and lay out to make the most beautiful diving interception you'll ever see;

* Just weeks after rejoining the hoops team, hang 21 points and 10 boards on Penn State during a second-round NCAA tournament game.

While the college landscape has been replete with two-sport stars the past decade -- Tony Gonzales, Ryan Minor and Josh Fields come to mind -- none have displayed the athletic versatility of Peppers. At 6'6" and 283 pounds, he is as fast as Terrell Owens (4.6 40), as strong as Shaq (bench presses 225 pounds 30 times), and moves with equal grace whether chasing down quarterbacks or filling the lane. One NFL coach claimed, "I was in Detroit, and Barry Sanders is the only guy I ever saw who can stop and start like Julius." A 300-pounder compared to Barry Sanders? Now that's saying something.

After eschewing the NBA, where scouts assured Peppers he would be a high draft pick, Julius joined the Carolina Panthers as the second pick in the 2002 NFL draft. Since his arrival, Peppers has racked up 17 sacks in 28 games, winning the Defensive Rookie of the Year award along the way and leading the Panthers from 1-15 the year before his arrival to last season's Super Bowl appearance.

3. Thierry Henry: This is going to be hit or miss. If you've ever seen Henry perform his magic for Arsenal or France, then you understand how deserving he is of this lofty position. If, however, you are one of the more ... shall we say ... close-minded types that tend to dot this nation's sports scene, my selection of a soccer player as the third greatest athlete in the world could prove more difficult to defend than the little white kid from Colorado.

Think of it this way, if you were going to create the perfect athlete, wouldn't he be someone who:

* Does things in his sport that no one has EVER done?

* Looks like he's playing at a different level?

* Routinely makes you pick up the phone to ask a buddy, "Did you just see that?"

Well, I've got news for you. No athlete in sports today -- not Barry Bonds, not Michael Vick, not Vince Carter or Lance Armstrong -- fits the bill better than Henry.

Remember Vick's 46-yard overtime scramble that beat the Vikings and cemented his place among the pantheon of "freaks?" Well, Henry pulled that off FOUR times in an English League match against Leeds in April, taking off on piercing runs that left some of the world's best defenders shaking their heads in amazement. His package of athleticism -- think Vick's speed, Allen Iverson's quickness, Dante Hall's acceleration and body control, and Vince's hops -- is so far beyond that of his peers, it's like watching that neighborhood kid that developed three years before everyone else dominate your son's CYO league. He is soccer's Randy Moss, only with a smaller ego and a larger vocabulary. Those four tallys against Leeds were just part of Henry's league-leading 30 goals, as he guided Arsenal to the first undefeated season (26-0-12) in 115 years of Premiership football.

What clinched Henry's place on this list was not a breathtaking finish, in fact, it wasn't even a goal. Rather, it was something he did against Blackburn United while slowly walking back to defend after the rival goalkeeper had gathered an Arsenal shot. As the keeper ran by on his way to punt, Henry, in one motion, wheeled, and in the split second that the falling ball was between the goalies hands and his swinging foot, swiped it cleanly, spun around the keeper, and tucked the ball into an empty net. While the goal was called back for unsportsmanlike conduct (only in England), it didn't matter. I immediately called Dean in New Jersey, and we quickly determined that in the several thousand soccer matches we've played and watched, we'd never seen anything like it. It was just one of about a dozen "Henry is ridiculous" conversations Dean and I have had in the last six months, the ultimate measure of an athlete's excellence.

2. Randy Moss: Finally, an athlete that needs no anecdotal support. Moss is probably the closest thing on this planet to physical genetic perfection. They have yet to invent a sport Moss, with a weekend to assimilate, couldn't master. At 6'5" and 200 pounds, with a 39-inch vertical and a 4.25 40, Moss can't be defended on the football field. He has the goods to play in the NBA. In college, he won the 55 and 200 meters at the Southern Conference Championships after only THREE days of practice. Fortunately, God made him dumber than a Jayson Williams trial juror, or else he surely would have enslaved us all by now.

All the evidence necessary to validate Moss' place among the world's best can be found in the 1999 Nike commercial featuring Moss and his West Virginia high-school basketball and football teammate, Jason Williams. Cue the "Dukes of Hazard" theme song.

Scene 1: A 17-year old Moss, rising up to dunk over some helpless mountain- town inbred. (Moss would go on to be named West Virginia's Mr. Basketball TWICE, despite sharing the court with Williams, who is now one of the 10 best point guards in the NBA with the Memphis Grizzlies.)

Scene 2: Moss, now at Marshall, catching a flanker screen against Army at his own 14-yard line, hurdling over a tackler, then out racing everyone to the end zone by a good 30 yards. (After catching a Techmo Bowl-like 28 touchdowns in 15 games as a sophomore, Moss added 25 more in only 12 games as a junior. In the Motor City Bowl against Mississippi, with much of the nation getting it's first glimpse of the big talent from the small school, he opened the game by catching an 80-yard TD on the first play from scrimmage.)

Scene 3: During a Monday night contest as a rookie with the Vikings, Moss goes up over two powerless defensive backs and comes down with his third touchdown of the night. (Moss would go on to catch a rookie-record 17 scoring grabs.)

Scene 4: After catching a seemingly harmless six-yard out pattern against the Cowboys on Thanksgiving day, Moss turns up field, throws a stutter-step on Darren Woodson on the sideline, and blows by the rest of the secondary for a 50-yard touchdown, again his third of the day.

With a resume like that, how can Moss not be the choice for Number 1? Well, it all goes back to what I mentioned before: While I suspect that Randy Moss is the most gifted athlete in the world, the proof is in the pudding, and there is a man out there with Moss-like gifts and an even more impressive list of accomplishments. And that man is...

1. Antwaan Randle El: Someone explain to me how this guy didn't even make it into the "Page 2" field of 64? While I confess that 5'10", 185 pounds doesn't sound overly intimidating, Randle El is the most well rounded professional athlete since Dave Winfield.

Here's what you know about Randle El...

He was a one-man show while playing football at Indiana University, finishing his career as the most statistically productive dual-threat quarterback ever, his numbers dwarfing those of more heralded players like Vick and Eric Crouch. In 44 games, he passed for 7,489 yards and 42 touchdowns and rushed for 3,895 yards and 44 more scores, the only player in NCAA Division I-A history to reach 6,000 yards passing and 3,000 yards rushing and also the only player to pass AND rush 40 touchdowns. Randle El also experimented at wide receiver, where he caught seven passes for 90 yards and a touchdown before his coach sobered up and put him back behind center. For the heck of it, Randle El also punted 17 times for 569 yards (33.5 avg) and returned 16 punts for 149 yards. Perhaps a Penn State linebacker put it best, when asked what it was like to play against Randle El, he responded, "Have you ever tried to catch a rabbit?"

After being chosen with the 30th overall pick by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 2002 NFL Draft, Randle El has continued to display his versatility, running plays at quarterback, wide receiver and running back, and handling all kick returns. As a rookie, he broke a 99-yarder on a kick-off, then forced this author to make one of those "Dad, did you just see that?" cross-country calls, when he took his second postseason punt return 66-yards to the house against the Cleveland Browns, breaking five tackles along the way.

Here's what you may not know about Randle El...

After earning All-State basketball honors for two years in high-school and leading the state of Illinois in assists during his senior campaign, Randle El went on to play two seasons for Bobby Knight at Indiana before deciding to focus solely on football. On the court, he was T.J. Ford before there was a T.J. Ford -- using his extraordinary quickness and omniscient court vision to penetrate and dish, and his agility and athleticism to dominate on the defensive end. Scouts predicted he would have been a first-round pick had he played out his career.

Here's what you definitely don't know about Randle El...

After a standout scholastic baseball career as an outfielder, Randle El was drafted in the 14th round of the MLB Draft by the Chicago Cubs. In case you think that may be a late pick, it is roughly 50 rounds earlier than future Hall of Famer Mike Piazza was selected by the Dodgers. They say Randle El was so fast out of the batters box, he could hit a grounder up the middle and get hit with the ball while sliding into second. He went on to play one season at Indiana before deciding Division I football, basketball, and baseball might be a bit much.

Perhaps Moss is more overtly gifted, Armstrong more singularly dominant, and Bonds and Kobe have developed their skills to unthinkable levels, but no one in the world of sports today has proven exceptional at a wider array of athletic endeavors than Antwaan Randle El. Give him his due. Sorry Page 2, but he's the World's Greatest Athlete.